Vivian Maier Street Photographer

Vivian Maier. I wish to do my bit to make sure the world knows this name. Vivian Maier, a French born photographer who past away in April of 2009, was a street photographer and nanny. She shot photos of mostly Chicago from the 50's to 70's. However, Her work was unknown up until 2009 when a young real estate agent named John Maloof went to an estate sale and bought a box with 30,000 negatives of her work. Maloof announced on Flickr of his find and pointed us to the blog he started on Maier's behalf. I've been following Maloof's blog since he first posted his find on Flickr in the discussion group HCSP (Hardcore Street Photography). It has been an amazing Flickr thread to witness and follow.

After being impressed with Maier's work, Maloof went hunting and purchased more boxes of negatives and brought the collection of Maier photos up to near 100,000 images. If you read through the Flickr thread, you'll witness how the efforts of Maloof's has now grown into a Kickstart documentary that is in the making and an art show at The Chicago Cultural Center. I must say, full credit goes to John Maloof for all his hard work and bringing Vivian Maier, perhaps one of the best discoveries in street photography, to our attention. His efforts and her art have recently made the news and a segment on Chicago Tonight can be viewed here.





A great story. Thanks, John!

$50K Photo Prize Announced

Scotiabank and Toronto's Contact Photography Festival announced today that the Toronto festival's renaming to be Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival and introduced the Scotiabank Photography Award for 2011.

The Scotiabank Photography Award will be the largest photography award dedicated to recognizing Canadian contemporary artists working in photography. Launching in September 2010 and to be awarded in 2011, the award will consist of a $50,000 cash prize, a pre-negotiated book publishing contract by internationally acclaimed photographic art publisher, Steidl, and a feature exhibition in the following year's Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival. World renowned Canadian photographer Ed Burtynsky will chair a panel of three judges for the award in 2011.

http://www.scotiabankcontactphoto.com/



Cheers,
Eric Milner
Still Photographer